Ai Weiwei: Good Fences, Good Neighbors

Ever since the amazing The Gates in Central Park exhibition in 2005, I've become a lover of public art. There's nothing cooler than seeing the streets and parks of NYC turned into a canvass for a creative vision. NYC is always interesting but is made only more so when parts of it are re-imagined, temporarily, as something else. That's the glory of art, one of the things that makes NYC great.

The famous Chinese artist and human rights activist Ai Weiwei has just mounted one of the most ambitious public arts projects in NYC history. It's called Good Fences, Good Neighbors and it's a multi-borough exhibit of fences -- yes, fences -- that highlight the plight of refugees and migrants who are fleeing wartorn countries and natural catastropheos. Fences can protect but they can also exclude -- something that refugees are keenly aware of but that most of cannot really appreciate 

-- and this exhibit drives that point home.

What makes this exhibit so particularly interesting is how is both grand and small. Some of the installations are tourist heavy, obvious places like Washington Square Park and Flushing Corona Park -- and others are on bus stops in Brooklyn and shelters in The Bronx. There is also an audio visual component to this exhibit too, with videos showing the plight of refugees in many far-flung parts of the world.

This project seems like a once-in-a-lifetime, you-were-there, blink-of-you'll-miss-it experience so, if you're in NYC, try to find it and check it out.

It runs until February, 2018. For a comprehensive list of locations, go here.